Anti-semitism in Berlin

Demonstrations against the big stores in Berlin to-day developed later in the evening into an active outbreak of anti-Semitism.

In several parts of Berlin a large number of people, most of whom appeared to be Jews, were openly attacked in the streets and knocked down. Some of them were seriously injured. The police could do no more than pick up the injured and take them off to hospital.

To-day Herr Göring, the Prussian Commissioner for the Ministry of the Interior, issued an order to the Storm Troops calling for stricter discipline, and asking them to refrain from acts of violence, but the order does not yet appear to have had the desired effect.

Picketing the big shops

During the busiest shopping hour this evening the following scene could be witnessed outside the Kadewe, the largest department store of the West End. A detachment of Storm Troops marched up to the shop, formed a cordon in front of the entrance, and put up a large notice, "Germans! Don't buy from Jews." The people inside the shop left hurriedly and no others were allowed to go in. The police looked on with apparent indifference. Many people who had assembled outside seemed to be favourably impressed by this demonstration, and talked cheerfully to the Storm Troopers, who assured them that "they would put an end to the Jewish shops."

About the same time exactly the same scene took place in front of Rosenheim's in the Kurfürstendamm. Rosenheim's is an expensive shop dealing in high-class leather goods, and it could hardly be suspected of "unfair competition." It was closed simply because it belongs to a Jew. The same thing happened outside one of the Tietz department stores, in front of the enormous shop of Karstaat in the south-east of Berlin, and in front of several Woolworth's and other "one-price shops."

Small shopkeeper's attitude

Such demonstrations have no doubt a propagandist value for the Nazi party. On the one hand they show that anti-Semitism is a doctrine that can be put into effect, and on the other the attack on the big department stores is welcomed by the small shopkeepers, most of whom are Nazis. If the propaganda is sufficiently persistent it can easily ruin the big shops, simply because people will be afraid to deal with them. There is a danger that the closing of the big shops will only increase unemployment.

A similar demonstration against Jewish shops took place in Essen yesterday. Since then the Essen headquarters of the Nazi party have published a statement declaring that the "action against Jewish shops" was carried out by Communists wearing the Storm Troop uniform. The Nazi "Völkisher Beobachter" published to-day a photograph of a letter purporting to be from the Tietz Company showing that it had paid money into the Communist party funds. This afternoon Tietz declared the letter to be a forgery.

Violence against socialists

The headquarters of the Socialist trade unions in Berlin were searched by Storm Troops last night, and most of the rooms were completely wrecked. Desks were broken, doors smashed, and pictures of leading Socialists torn from the walls and trampled to pieces. A safe which could not be opened had its handles torn off. In Zittau, in Saxony, the Socialist headquarters were broken into by Storm Troops, who later burnt publicly all books, newspapers, and documents found in the building.

In Brunswick Storm Troops are reported to have plundered a Socialist newspaper office. A Socialist advertising agent was shot dead. Police stood around the office, and their report declares that the affair was undertaken in the interests of public order. In Dresden two Socialist deputies were gravely injured by persons believed to have been Storm Troopers. One of the deputies was badly mishandled and dragged down the stairs by his feet, while the other was found lying in the street in a pool of blood. Herr Paulick, a prominent Socialist, was attacked in a dark street at Dessau by an unknown person and received severe face injuries.

These "isolated acts" may be taken at least as an indication of what is going on in Germany. With the press of the Left entirely suppressed, it is extremely difficult to obtain any information except of a purely fragmentary kind, and incomplete police reports, most of which do not even appear in the German press. At Trier 150 Nazis broke into Marx House, where Karl Marx was born, and hoisted on it the Swastika flag.